Bringing Home Strays
by Jayie The Hufflepuff
Summary: The TARDIS remembers every stray companion the Doctor has ever brought on board - or ever will. She sees their lives in glimpses and snatches of time, an unnoticed observer, knowing both past, present, and future of all who set foot in her. A look at how she views each Companion.


She remembered all of them – will remember – knows. The strays her thief brought home. And will bring home. She calls – called - them strays, and some of them were, but in truth they were all important. Important. Funny word that. Why would the word exist to differentiate if, as her thief said, everyone was important? She didn't know if she believed it or not. But she did know that every human who'd walked in her halls were important.

The one after the Bad Wolf, the clever one, was there when her thief had been in pain. Her poor thief, lost without his Rose. The clever one had come and helped him, and that was enough to make her welcome.

But then her Doctor had made her change him. She'd made him into a human, a human cut off from her, who couldn't remember her or talk to her. The loss of connection to the Doctor - _her_ Doctor – had been painful. But the clever one had been there. She'd left her to hide in the dark, but she came every day to talk to her, to tell her how the Doctor was doing, to play his voice, the voice of her thief. She was grateful for the clever one's company. This girl was no Doctor, but she had kept a clueless man safe without his knowledge and had cared for her when she was alone. She was always grateful to the clever one after that, and although she missed her when she was gone, she was glad the girl left in peace rather than in pieces.

Then there was the important one. The lady in white. She'd been pulled in by huon energy, but there was something far more interesting about her. There were traces of _fate_ around her – ooo, not the right word, fate wasn't real. But all the same, there was a tugging sensation, as though this human was pulling the threads of time to center around her. She had been livid when her thief had left without this human. Didn't he see? Couldn't he understand how important she had been – would be? So she took him back, over and over, letting the important one pull her back as often as it took for her thief to find her again.

Of course, once she was on board, the important one turned out to be perfectly ordinary. Dull, loud, irritating, and one hundred percent boring human. But there was still that feeling around her. The pull of time around her, the unconcious centering of the universe around her. She was ordinary and annoying, but totally and completely _important_. The signs only grew stronger and stronger with time, until they were sent falling, falling, falling together, falling into the fire, the TARDIS and her guest. Then it all came together. The important one created a new Doctor, her thief but not her thief, and the woman and this Doctor were different but the same, and there was so much power between them. They did more than save the universe – they saved _all_ the universes, all of the alternate realities that existed ever. For that moment, all of time revolved around that completely ordinary human. It reminded her, as few things could, of how truly amazing an ordinary human could be.

And then she was torn down. The Doctor stripped down her mind, tore out the memories, cut her off from the universe she had saved. She didn't miss the important one herself, not the loud screeching or the brusque treatment of the ship. But she mourned the loss of that great mind, that enormous potential.

Then it was just her and her thief again. She was divided on how she felt about the strays, the companions, her Doctor so insisted on. Those companion took up much of his love and attention. They could talk to him, laugh with him, touch him, as she never could. There were days (minutes, hours, seconds, decades... time was a slippery thing) that she burned with jealousy for how _alive_ they were, alive with the Doctor. _Her_ Doctor.

But they did something wonderful for her thief; they kept him safe from himself. She loved her thief to the universe and back, but she knew him better than maybe he knew himself. She had seen him. The Timelord Victorious. The Dreamlord. The dark side that was locked away. He was a wonderful, wonderful man, but only as long as there was someone there, someone _human_, so gloriously, boringly human, to keep that dark side locked away. She knew how much her thief hated himself. He hated the dark god hidden away in him. His companions kept him safe, kept him, for lack of a better word, or maybe it was the perfect word, human. If it weren't for her own affection for each and everyone one of them, their service to the Doctor would be enough to make her love them.

Which is why she loved the orangey girl as she did. The first feet, besides those of her Doctor, to walk upon her new rooms. A new companion for the new Doctor and his new TARDIS. Fiery, like the important one, but different. Not just a friend. Family. Her and her mate, the brave one. The Doctor didn't usually bring men on board, and such a pretty one too, with a truer heart than any human she'd seen. They, more than any of the humans her Doctor had adopted, were family. _They_ had adopted _him_, and, in a sense, her as well. The girl who was both mother and friend, and the boy who held her as she died and felt the echo of it even as she lived on in the ship. Such kind, pure hearts. Such love.

Then they were gone. She didn't need the Doctor to tell her, to walk in alone without his usual shadows, to know what had happened. She'd felt it; the ripping of the threads of time, the fading presence of those two loved people, as they were ripped from her world forever. Gone. Just like that. Lives are such fleeting things.

It hurt to lose them. Memories floated in every hall, little reminders of the family that was gone. There was the room they'd shared together. There was the console room where they'd talked and laughed together. So much pain and loss, and her Doctor was suffering. Those memories hurt him too.

So she did the only thing she could - she changed. Took away everything about herself that could remind him of his family. The bright colors, the homey feeling, the warm reds and browns. She became cold and dark because he needed her to be. And in a way, she needed to be for herself. The Doctor wasn't the only one who'd lost someone.

Then she came. The mystery girl. Her Doctor had been in such pain, and then the girl had come. Flirty and clever and curious, but there was something else. There was something _very_ strange about this girl. But she never found out what. Mystery girl was only there for moments before being ripped out. She fell, fell, fell before the Doctor was able to catch her. The girl lay so cold and still on her floor. Dead... but not dead. A mystery.

She worried her Doctor would be in pain again, but he raced in grinning like a child, his thoughts swirling with the mystery girl, dead but not dead. "Watch me run," he said. So she ran with him, pulling him where he wanted - or needed - to go to find her. The mystery girl who had healed the Doctor.

So many friends had walked on her floors. She saw them through veiled eyes, seeing only snatches of their lives, never fully knowing them. But there were two she knew better than any before. One was her daughter. The other had seen her heart, and revealed hers.

The Doctor had been in such pain when the blond girl had come. Destroyer of two worlds, soldier of an endless war, committer of genocide. And so very alone. But the blond girl came and healed him as she never could. The way her thief looked at that girl, the way he could never look at her. She had liked the brave, spunky child, but had been so very jealous too, perhaps with this girl more than any of the others. But she let the blond child walk her floors and, when the Doctor asked, took her home where she'd be safe.

Then something happened she didn't expect. The blond child tore her open and gazed into her heart. She was thrown into the child's mind, seeing her thoughts more clearly than she'd seen anything, thoughts so utterly _human_. She saw Rose Tyler, for that was her name, names are funny, and she saw her hopes and dreams and fears. But more clear than anything was the girl's last thought, repeating over and over. _The Doctor is in danger. Save him!_

So she did. She and Rose created the Bad Wolf together, cast it all over the universe, then sailed through time and space to save her Doctor - _our Doctor,_ Rose's mind protested quietly, but she ignored her. She used the child to burn the Dalek creatures who threatened her Doctor, letting herself feel the power her new form offered her. So much power, power to conquer worlds, to heal them and change them forever. The true power of a TARDIS unleashed. She could save them all!

Then he came again, her thief, her wonderful, beautiful thief. He looked like his world was being torn in two. The Rose child's mind was fighting hard now to gain control, trying to reach out to the man she loved. She tried to push the child's silly mind away, but the terror in her Doctor's eyes stopped her. There was so much fear there, so much love. It didn't matter to him that the Rose could be used to save worlds. Rose Tyler meant more to him than anything, and she could feel the same love in Rose's mind. So she let go. She let herself be pulled into the Doctor, her energy destroying him, killing him again, and this time is was her fault. But it didn't matter. As long as Rose Tyler was safe, her thief was happy.

And Rose Tyler was happy too, she could see that. Even after she had left that body, she could feel Rose's mind, and she had seen her heart. She had been wrong to be jealous. Her Doctor needed Rose Tyler, and Rose Tyler needed him. The girl's mind had been so human. It had been a reminder of why her Doctor went to such lengths for such ordinary creatures.

When the orangey girl first set foot on her floors, she had felt that the girl would be important somehow. Then the pretty one came, and a new life was started. The child that the orangey one carried was no ordinary child. She had been there at the child's creation, and she was as mother to the little one as the one who carried her. The child was part TARDIS, with a mind connected to her own. She had even helped to name her in a way. After all, she'd been the first one to tell them "the only water in the forest is the River."

The child was taken, but she came back. Wild-haired, older on the outside, and so uncertain. The mind of a killer but the heart of a young girl. She'd spoken to her daughter, her River Song, and showed her the controls. Even the Doctor couldn't hear her as well as River. Her daughter understood. She worked the controls better than her thief ever could, the hate in her fading every moment. Then she too was gone.

But not forever. She came back, over and over, sometimes older, sometimes younger, playing with time like her mother before her. She too had the Doctor's love, but there was no jealousy this time, only love for the daughter she had helped shape. Melody Pond might be the daughter of two humans, but River Song was the child of the TARDIS.

Sometimes, she wondered if she or the Doctor were more scared of the last day River's feet would ever walk her floors.

She was more connected with time than even her Doctor. She saw past, present, and future all at once, and she could see the changes that were made in each. The actions of her thief constantly changed the threads of time, like the surface of a river, always reflecting, always changing, never staying still. She saw it all at once. Even as Rose first first walked on her floors, fkashes of her future began appearing. She was falling into the void... no, it was the Doctor who was falling... she was being shot by a Dalek... no, the Dalek spared her... there was the void again. Different futures, coming and going faster, a new future replacing the old as the present changed it. Same with the clever one, and orangey girl and the pretty one.

The important one's future, however, was somewhat more fixed. The woman had been destined (bad word destined, destined implied fact, fact was impossible in a world of constant change) to become part Timelord. Not much could have changed that. She had seen that future the instant the important one had been pulled into her console room.

River's future was – is – will be – fixed as well. It had already happened, and was still to come. Two different timelines, twined around that one point, that one fixed point. She had already seen her daughter end, and it was still to come, and there was nothing she or her thief could do to stop it. It haunted her. When River's feet echoed in her halls, she was struck with images of her daughter's sacrifice.

She still remembered something her daughter had once said – will say. "Everybody knows that everybody dies, and nobody knows it better than the Doctor." That wasn't – isn't - true. She, who could see the deaths of everyone who ever entered her, knew it better than even her thief. He didn't see all that she did. He could still hope. But she was doomed to see it all. Death, life, end, beginning. She knew it all at once.

But as long as her Doctor needed a human companion at his side, she would do her best to care for them and love them, as her thief would want.

* * *

Well, I have recently thrown all sense of regard for my emotional state out the window and become a Whovian. So I finished all six and a half seasons of New Who in fourteen days and felt inspired to write a quick one-shot. I hope it was understandable that this is all in the point of view of the TARDIS. I really liked the episode The Doctor's Wife, and thought that since the TARDIS is sentiment and can see both present and future, that her views on the companions must be very interesting. So here they are as I see them.


End file.
